


One, Two, Step

by DestielsDestiny



Category: Captain America (Movies), Marvel Cinematic Universe
Genre: Aftermath of Torture, Amnesia, Avengers Family, Avengers Feels, Avengers Tower, Awesome Phil Coulson, Bucky Barnes Feels, Bucky Barnes Has Issues, Bucky Barnes Needs a Hug, Bucky Barnes Recovering, Bucky Barnes Remembers, Domestic Avengers, Fanboy Phil Coulson, Flashbacks, Gen, Hurt Bucky Barnes, Hurt/Comfort, Implied/Referenced Torture, M/M, POV Bucky Barnes, POV Second Person, Post-Traumatic Stress Disorder - PTSD, Tony Feels, Tony Stark Has A Heart, Violence
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2015-06-24
Updated: 2015-06-24
Packaged: 2018-04-05 22:43:08
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,843
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/4197804
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/DestielsDestiny/pseuds/DestielsDestiny
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>You remember how to dance. You don’t remember learning how.</p>
            </blockquote>





	One, Two, Step

**Author's Note:**

> A/N: I own nothing.

You stumble in after Stevie like a lost puppy, head close to the ground, shoulders slumped. He could be leading you to your death. Part of you wishes he were. Another, deeper part, knows he never would. You kinda want to hate him for that. But you never will. 

You risk a glance up when light hits your eyeballs from enough directions to be damn near painful. Glass. It’s the only word to describe it. Everything, even the damn floor, is glass. 

Glass and light. And when did you start swearing a blue streak. And what’s a blue streak anyway. 

You almost miss the Chair. Almost. 

Footsteps approach Stevie, who you realize has stopped in the center of the glass world, comfortable like he knows what he’s doing there. Like he belongs. There’s something wrong about that, but you can no longer remember what it is. What it was. Is.

You stare resolutely at the glass, welcoming the pain. You don’t listen to the raised voices barely a foot from your left hand. The one that’s Wrong somehow. 

English, New York accents. Stevie and another. Male. Mid-forties. Familiar. Assessment. Non-threat.

You stand by. You are not to eavesdrop. Ever. So you don’t.

A shifting, hissing sound. Light fills your vision. Different. Blue. Focused. 

Sharp brown eyes snap into yours. Searching. Softening. You know those eyes. You knew those eyes.

“I killed your parents.” You say. 

“I know.” He says. 

\--  
Stevie used to tease you about your dancing. You’re not sure why. You’re not half bad. 

\--  
You nickname the glass world’s central voice Wall Doc. 

Brown eyes and Blue light looks at you strangely. Big Guy laughs. Stevie smiles like he’s just won a lottery. Whatever that is. 

One-wing asks you if you like movies. You stare at Wall Doc’s display as it scrolls through brightly lit faces and colourful images, your metal finger abruptly jabbing out fast and strong enough to crack the screen, if it wasn’t made of air. 

Brown eyes and Blue light stares at you for a long time, before grinning hard enough that it hurts your eyes all the more. 

\--  
You killed Howard and Maria Stark on a Wednesday in November. You don’t remember the year. 

She was the target. He was the collateral. You don’t remember why. 

He remembered you. You didn’t remember him. 

\--  
You call Brown eyes and Blue light Howie on your 545th hour in the world of glass that the Big Guy calls a Tower. 

You are in a purple not-a-lab-buddy-I-promise. Your arm is deconstructed on the table to your left. Big Guy got really green when they took pictures of it and left the room to go look at pictures of squirrels, according to Brown eyes and Blue light. What are squirrels you wonder. You don’t ask. 

A screwdriver enters your peripheral vision, and you flinch to the side, words spilling from loose lips. 

“Damnit Howie, warn a guy why don’t you.”

You are more shocked than Brown eyes and Blue light. Slightly. 

You think the colour change in his face is called turning pale as milk. You like milk. Hawk let you try some earlier. You liked it. You think. 

A chocked voice hits your ears. “Sure buddy, I’m Howie.”

You think that sounds wrong. You’re not sure why. You must look puzzled, because Brown eyes and Blue light quirks a brow at you. Big Guy calls it a sardonic expression. 

“Hey, at least it’s shorter, certainly beats being called BeBl.”

That doesn’t sound like a word to you, but neither is Howie. You aren’t sure what Howie is, who Howie is, but you like it, whatever it is. 

“Howie.” Your voice sounds both questioning and decisive. 

“Sure buddy, that’s fine.” That’s a lie, you realize. 

But you can’t quite remember what a lie is, so you let Howie get back to fixing your arm. 

\--

You catch Howie kissing Big Guy on your fifth consecutive week in the tower. There’s some time between weeks three and four which is strangely fuzzy, and the weather is slightly warmer than it should be, you think, but you can’t be sure, so you never bring it up. 

You were looking for Howie, Stevie is away and Howie’s the only one who doesn’t seem twitchy when you’re in the same room. Hawk compares you to a puppy following his master around at dinner one night. You shatter the table top. It was made of something called granite. 

You know the word master, somehow, even though you could swear you’ve never heard it before. You don’t know why you break the table. You felt…something. So you broke it. 

Nobody was hurt. You know that was intentional. You stare at the red globs of something slightly bitter, cranberries Spider tells you when you asked earlier, staring until a hand settles decisively onto your left arm. The Wrong one. The one that doesn’t fit. The one that hurts. 

You don’t lash out. That is also intentional. This you know. 

Brown eyes reflect off a dim blue light, staring into your own. There’s something there. It’s not judgement. 

“I don’t know what a puppy is.” You say. 

He throws his head at an abrupt angle and makes a sound vaguely resembling the cackling speckled things Big Guy was watching on the TV last night. Hyenas he called them.

He throws an arm around your shoulder, so carelessly, steering you towards the open kitchen door. You hesitate. He stops. 

“Come on buddy, I just want to show what a puppy is.” You suspect there is something beyond ridiculous about this statement. 

He leads. You follow. 

You stand watching for the longest time, caught up in something, a memory of a memory. There’s something you can’t quite…

Howie throws his head back suddenly, hyenas entering the hall beyond, in harmony with Big Guy’s quiet chuckling. 

You remember this is called laughter.   
\--  
You were sent after a Professor Charles Xavier once in 1981. You asked why. 

Because he is a freak, someone responds. It is the first question you’ve ever asked, to your knowledge. It’s also the last.

You miss the shot. 

You don’t remember why.   
\--  
You see a picture in Hawk’s room. You don’t remember how you got there. Hawk is there too, so is Spider. 

You pick up the picture. Hawk pales. You drop it. The Wrong arm catches it.

“He’s alive.” You say. Hawk looks like Howie did the day he died. But Howie’s upstairs. There’s something wrong there. You’re too dumb to figure out what. 

You don’t remember what dumb means.   
\--  
Suit arrives a week later. You remember seven breakfasts in between your gaff and a pressed figure in a suit sitting eating pancakes on the eighth. 

You like pancakes. You don’t remember what a gaff is. 

Hawk doesn’t leave Suit’s side. Suit looks at you like you’re a sideshow freak. 

Or maybe a precious stone. You can’t tell which. 

You don’t come to breakfast again for nineteen days. 

On the nineteenth day, Hawk crawls into the maintenance access tube you’ve taken up residence in, carefully balancing a plate of blueberry pancakes. 

Big Guy asked you what your favourite flavour was. You didn’t know what a flavour was. 

Blueberries are awesome. 

Hawk holds out the plate. It has syrup. You like syrup. You think, you liked syrup. 

“Phil made them.” You aren’t sure what a Phil is, but they smell good. 

You take the plate. Hawk holds the edge for a second. He meets your eyes, dead center. 

“Thank you.” He sounds like he’s poured his heart out onto his sleeve. 

You aren’t entirely sure what a Thank You is, but “You’re welcome.”

He releases the plate. 

The next morning, you come to breakfast. Phil makes really good pancakes.

\--  
You kissed Stevie under the Mistletoe the Christmas you turned sixteen. 

You don’t remember why. 

\--  
You wake up on your fifty-fourth consecutive week in the tower to discover it has snowed in New York. Apparently this is odd. 

Stevie tugs you downstairs. He’s so excited, you swear you thought he was smaller. 

A tree stretches three stories into the glass rafters. It glows a pleasant green and red. 

You didn’t know trees grew inside. 

The base of the tree barks sharply. A wet nose is suddenly pressed against your hand. Your real one. Fur feels soft, you discover. 

Howie is grinning like the Cheshire Cat. 

“He’s for you.” He says. 

“What is he?” You ask. Stevie chokes behind you. He hasn’t done that in a long time. 

Howie tilts his head to the side. You sense oncoming hyena calls. 

“He’s a Mutt.”

Stevie always wanted a dog. Mutt sits on your bare foot and barks once, sharply. 

It sounds nothing like a hyena. 

You kiss Stevie under the Mistletoe for the second time later that same day. 

Hyena calls fill the background. You don’t care. 

You’re happy. 

You’re not sure what happy is, but Wall Doc is an excellent dictionary.   
\--  
You walk straight up to Pirate the first time he swaggers into the Tower. You are of a height. 

“I want to see Professor Charles Frances Xavier.” You say.

His smile is feral. He mutters something that sounds a bit like “bout damn time.”

He holds out a hand. “Welcome back Sergeant.”

You take his hand, pumping up and down firmly like your daddy taught you. 

You remember this is called a handshake.   
\--

You go to Westchester on Stevie’s bike. You sit for precisely five minutes outside the front door, listening to voices call within. You hear the words Charles and Erik and Logan a lot. 

You don’t go in. 

You turn the bike around. And you drive home.   
\--

You ask Wall Doc to play soft music in your quarters that night. Stevie is there. You think it’s called a date. 

You hold out a hand. The Wrong one. It is rock steady. 

“May I have this dance?” You say. 

“I don’t know how Bucky.” He says. 

So you show him how to dance. 

He’s not half bad.  
\--

You stand in the living room with its glass windows, gazing out at New York. Stevie is in your room, sleeping. It is night. You think it is 2014. 

Howard Stark’s son slowly ambles across the glassed in floor towards you. You remember his father, younger than his son is now. Far younger than when you killed him. You don’t shy away from the memory. You don’t let it consume you either. 

Howie’s son hesitates for far longer than you hoped he would, far shorter than you thought he would. 

An oil grimy hand extends your way. The fingers look like his father’s. 

“Hi. My name is Tony.”

Tony. A name, like Howie. Name. Something someone calls themselves. A designation, no, a name. Things have designations. People have names. 

“Hi Tony, I’m Bucky.” A name. Your name. You are a person. Your name is James Buchanan Barnes, you are ninety-eight years old, and you are a person. 

“Nice to meet you Bucky.” He says. 

“Nice to meet you too Tony.” You say.


End file.
